


Kissing Air

by NeoDiji



Category: Tales of Zestiria
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fluff, Humor, Invisible Kissing, Kissing, M/M, Unintentional Halfway Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-01
Updated: 2017-01-01
Packaged: 2018-09-13 21:49:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9143563
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NeoDiji/pseuds/NeoDiji
Summary: The illustrious Shepherd gets caught kissing air by the humans he meets on his journey. SorMik.Interrelated oneshots revolving around this theme. Anime canon divergent.





	

**Author's Note:**

> So the number one thing I started daydreaming about upon falling into SorMik was the "What would people say if they saw Sorey making out with air/an invisible Mikleo?" idea. How would they explain it, what would the reaction be, etc. 
> 
> Planning on building related oneshots centered around this repetitive event. After all, there are LOTS of humans Sorey and Company meet along the way~
> 
> Sorry for any mistakes. Unbeta'ed but written with ~~SorMik~~ love.
> 
> Disclaimer: I neither own nor make any profit from this Tales of Zestiria fanfiction. My only proceeds come in the form of kudos, comments, and Tumblr notifications and messages. (@NeoDiji)

“Ah, sorry, could you please repeat that?” Sorey asked with an awkward little laugh, glancing sideways to where Alisha was keeping pace with him on horseback. The soldiers and wagons were relatively loud as the caravan crawled across the landscape, but they were the least of Sorey’s worries that afternoon. It was hard to focus on anything with Mikleo wrapped so tightly around him.

Smiling softly, Alisha asked, “Have you noticed any difference in regards to seeing Seraphim ever since you became the Shepherd?”

That’s right. They hadn’t had _that_ conversation yet, and Alisha still had no idea that Sorey had been able to see Seraphim all along. With Mikleo invisibly nuzzling into the back of his neck, though, this wasn’t the time. So with a quick jerk of his head, inwardly grateful that her turn of phrase allowed him to tell the truth without delving into that whole debacle, Sorey said, “Nah, I haven’t noticed any changes.”

Alisha slumped the tiniest bit on her horse. “I see,” she mused, obviously disappointed. “It’s to be expected, of course. These things take time.” Brightening, she lifted her face to the sunshine. “If anyone is ever to see Seraphim again, it will be you, Shepherd Sorey!”

“J-just ‘Sorey’ is fine,” the Shepherd reminded her, breath hitching as Mikleo’s slender fingers slid tantalizingly up and down his chest, occasionally stopping to toy with his new sacred cloak.

Nodding with a small blush of embarrassment, Alisha said, “Sorey, then. What do you think the Seraphim look like?” Her eyes sparkled with excitement.

“Beautiful,” Sorey blurted earnestly without thinking, sneaking a quick peek over his shoulder at his beloved water Seraph. From his vantage point, he saw only a splash of white hair, but it was enough to make his heart pound faster beneath Mikleo’s fluttering hand.

Alisha nodded again, a faraway look in her eyes. “I suppose they must be,” she agreed, her tone filled with wistful longing. “Someday _I_ want to see Seraphim. And thank them for everything they’ve done for this world!”

Relaxing back into Mikleo’s hold, Sorey smiled at the princess-knight. “Something tells me they’re getting your message, Alisha.”

As the Shepherd, his words took on the weight that eased from the young woman’s shoulders.

Mikleo pressed reassuring kisses into Sorey’s own shoulder blades, lending his strength and support from behind.

Sorey sighed blissfully and clasped Mikleo’s hand, pressing it tighter to his breast. To anyone else, especially from afar, he’d simply look like a passionate young man holding his hand to his heart. Sorey’s smile softened as he looked at the sky, silently calculating how many hours of riding they still had before making camp for the night. He loved when Mikleo got touchy-feely—it didn’t happen often, especially in ‘public’—but these were special circumstances, and he wanted to secretly share a horse with his one and only for as long as possible.

Upon pulling out the sacred blade and agreeing to be the Shepherd of Legend, Sorey had purified the hellion attacking the festival and promptly fallen unconscious to the sounds of his name. He’d woken to a wet washcloth over his head, a relieved human friend, a contented fire Seraph, and a still-anxious-but-trying-to-hide-it water Seraph boyfriend. After learning that he’d slept for three days straight, feverish and delirious—“You kept mumbling nonsense in your sleep: Mik…leo…Mikleo, again and again,” explained Alisha worriedly over breakfast—Sorey had been presented with a customized Shepherd cloak, complete with his trademark feathers. He’d almost slipped then and revealed Mikleo and Lailah to Alisha, only biting his tongue at the last second to keep himself from responding to his boyfriend’s teasing. There would be time to press his lipsticked-up self on Mikleo later.

Restraining himself, Sorey had hitched a ride with Alisha to the castle proper and taken the day to explore the ruins beneath the city while she was busy attending to her political duties. In the depths of the ruins, weak with relief after purifying some bat hellions, Sorey’s control had snapped and he’d launched himself at Mikleo with a whimpered groan. Mikleo had gasped but held on tight, wrapping his arms around Sorey in a mutually protective embrace as their mouths sought each other repeatedly and stirred more heat around them than Lailah’s fire artes. Under the golden dragon statue’s searing eyes and Lailah’s carefully averted gaze, Sorey had bent Mikleo slightly backwards as he all but devoured his Seraph lover’s lips, finding zest through Mikleo even as the malevolence sapped his strength.

It had been the lingering malevolence that had finally caused the two lovers to break apart, touching their foreheads lovingly together as they’d caught their breath and tried to re-focus. Lailah had blushed as bright as her element, but she’d only said, “I suspected as much” and gone on to detail how Mikleo had never left Sorey’s side while he’d been out. Her pure acceptance and lighthearted teasing had soon been overshadowed by the dark truths contained within the ruins, and talk of Sorey’s and Mikleo’s relationship had been pushed to the backburner in favor of running for their lives. They’d raced upwards to the stormy streets, their ardent kisses forgotten in the wake of pure malevolence, calamity incarnate, manifesting in the whirling skies above Ladylake.

Due to some odd stroke of luck, the dragon had flown away of its own accord without causing _too_ much damage. The people had celebrated Sorey as the reason for its disappearance, and his reputation as a capable Shepherd had skyrocketed as a result of this erroneous assumption. Sorey had been approached by the head of the Hyland Council, shifted around as a potential political pawn, but eventually released to accompany Princess Alisha out of the city in her quest to deliver medicine to Marlind. He’d decided to eventually veer off from her route to reach Rayfalke Spiritcrest in hopes of learning more about dragons and finding his answers as the Shepherd, but in the meantime, the Princess and her entourage were his traveling companions.

As well as Lailah, riding in a wagon, and Mikleo, pressed up against Sorey’s back on their shared saddle.

A lot had happened in a short period of time, and Sorey relished any comfort that Mikleo dared to give him. They’d been aching for alone time, but with someone always needing the Shepherd, their time together off-duty was scarce. Away from Lailah’s knowing eyes, but unseen by the rest of their party, now was the best chance they had to indulge themselves. Sorey only wished he could turn around and kiss Mikleo like he deserved.

Like they _both_ deserved.

-+-

“You’ve been driving me _crazy_ ,” Sorey chided, though his green eyes were shining with mirth and his lips were stretched in the widest smile imaginable. The sun had finally gone down, but they made their own light. Eyes slipping partly shut, he leaned down and met Mikleo halfway, carefully maneuvering them farther around the big tree shielding them from sight.

Pulling back a bit, Mikleo mumbled cheekily, “Or maybe you’ve always been crazy and you’re just now realizing it.” He impishly twirled Sorey’s feather earrings between his fingers as he leaned up for a peck.

“If I am, it’s because of you anyway,” Sorey shot back afterwards with an arched eyebrow and another, harder kiss. “Besides, what does that make you?” he asked between two more successive kisses, pulling the water Seraph even closer. “You’re the one loving me.”

Chuckling huskily, Mikleo agreed, “You’re right. I must be even crazier.” Tilting his head further back, his violet eyes caught the rising moonlight, shining all the brighter from the pure love emanating from within. One hand clutched Sorey’s shoulder while the other made itself at home grasping at the fine, brown hair at the nape of the brunet’s neck. He shivered as Sorey wound his arms tighter around him, splaying his hands and clearly getting the water Seraph back for the hours he’d clung to the Shepherd so desperately. “Ah, Sor— _ey_!” Mikleo’s moan cut off as the Shepherd playfully dipped his tongue inside, his blood heating up as their touches escalated and that first movement sparked an all-out tongue war reminiscent of their normal sparring sessions but with more heat and less risk.

Mikleo’s moan broke off, not that it would have mattered.

Sorey’s didn’t.

“O-oh, Sorey?!” Alisha gasped, coming around the tree and clutching a bedroll. “Here you are! But what are you…?” She had the oddest look on her face, confused and slightly disturbed.

Mikleo winced as he realized what this must look like to her. The renowned Shepherd, rumpled and messy, groping air and flicking his tongue in strange ways, eyes clenched shut as he moaned loudly, ignoring the drip of drool at the corner of his mouth… Sorey surely didn’t seem very reputable at the moment. The impeccable water Seraph was glad that his own thoroughly-kissed self was invisible, that was for sure. Sorey did better with attention anyway.

“Uh,” Sorey managed, frozen but at least not actively kissing Mikleo anymore. He looked everywhere but at the princess-knight, eyes now wide and swimming with shock. “You see, I can explain, Alisha.”

Mikleo sighed. This wasn’t exactly the way they’d wanted to come out to their new friend.

Slowly straightening, Sorey declared with a highly questioning undertone, “I’m just…performing a sacred Shepherd’s ritual!” He grinned widely and rubbed the back of his head, his normal embarrassed mannerisms taking hold.

Groaning, Mikleo slapped a hand to his face in utter mortification. “You _really_ can’t lie, Sorey,” he huffed. As always, it would be up to him to get them out of this mess—

Alisha took a hurried step back. “Oh, I see!” She clutched the bedroll tighter in her hands and looked to the side. “I’m so sorry, Sorey. I had no idea. Please excuse my rudeness!” She bowed deeply, her hair falling over her shoulder. “I did not mean to interrupt your important Shepherd duties! Do carry on and I’ll—leave your bedroll and some other basic supplies next to this tree. So you can use them when you have need of them.” Still hunched over, she took a small step backwards. “Again, Sorey, please forgive me for my intrusion! I ask that the Seraphim take note that this disruption was my fault! Let them continue to cover you in their blessings.” She took some more steps back, and her voice trailed off as she respectfully left the scene, all the while stunning both boys with her continuous gullible reaction: “I beseech you, almighty Seraphim! Let not my mistakes interfere with the Shepherd’s power…”

“She bought it,” Sorey said weakly, finally wiping away the spot of drool on the corner of his lip. He turned to his water Seraph with a triumphant gleam in his eye. “And you said I couldn’t survive in the human world because I can’t lie convincingly!”

Mikleo bemusedly shook his head. “You got lucky, Sorey.”

“But—”

“No one except Alisha would’ve fallen for that one,” Mikleo pointed out with a resigned sigh. “We’ll have to come up with a better explanation for when this happens again.”

Sorey perked up, his face beaming as he enthusiastically latched on to his boyfriend’s words and clarified, “So you’re saying this is going to keep happening?!”

Rolling his eyes, Mikleo said, “Don’t get too excited. We need to be more discreet if we’re going to keep sneaking around like this.” They needed to have a working plan, taking factors into consideration that hadn’t been an issue in Elysia. “I’m invisible to the humans, but you’re not. More than that, you’re the Shepherd. You have to set a standard.”

Still grinning, Sorey placed a hand on his hip and said in a sing-song, “I’m hearing that I’ll keep getting to kiss you as long as I’m smart about it!”

“That’ll be the day,” Mikleo sassed back, stepping into Sorey’s personal space. “I’ll have a lot of time doing nothing tomorrow while we ride, so I’ll think of something.” Voice dropping invitingly, he suggested, “You just keep focusing on those positives.”

Sorey smiled and leaned in. “Will do,” he murmured cheerfully against Mikleo’s lips, and they lost themselves in their newly-traditional, previously-interrupted sacred Shepherd’s ritual.


End file.
